Brave Amy's battle with spine condition

8:30am Thursday 28th August 2008

Comments (1)   Have your say »

THE thought of never being able to ride again gave teenager Amy Hewson all the determination she needed to fight a degenerative spine condition.

Sixteen-year-old Amy was left heartbroken when doctors broke the news that she would have to undergo surgery to stabilise the increasing curve in her back.

The school leaver, who lives in Tormarton with her parents Caroline and David, was told she would need metal rods in her spine to stabilise her condition, called scoliosis, meaning she could never mount a horse again. "I have been riding all my life and I did not want to give up my hobby," said Amy, who completed her GCSEs at Chipping Sodbury School in July.

"They told me it would be too dangerous to continue and that is what spurred me into finding treatment."

Amy and her family searched for an alternative on the internet and more than a year since her diagnosis, she checked in to a private clinic in Suffolk.

The Scoliosis SOS clinic came up with a programme of exercises tailored to Amy and after just a month, the vertebra rotation which threatened her future has dramatically reduced.

"I had to go for physiotherapy every day while I was there and learn all about the condition," she told the Gazette.

"I have to do half an hour of the exercises every day for the rest of my life," said Amy, who returned home two weeks ago. "But there is a good reason to do it if I can carry on horse riding."

Dad David said: "Amy did not want the operation and it is really a commitment on her part to do these exercises.

"She will always need the special equipment we have had to buy for her but the operation was risky and was not a solution to scoliosis."

Mum Caroline added: "The NHS only offer the operation, but Amy would have needed more surgery in 25 years and it is purely a cosmetic solution.

"To have the treatment Amy has had cost us £4,500 and we have had no help. It is disgusting really."

Amy, who works part-time as a waitress at the Players Golf Club in Codrington, only discovered the condition after having her appendix taken out in emergency surgery during a school trip to Austria in May 2007.

Her mum flew to nurse her daughter and found one of Amy’s ribs was protruding through her skin.

"I thought immediately that something was not right," said Mrs Hewson, who works at the Little Acorns Nursery in Yate.

But Amy’s health trouble came in threes when soon after her recovery from appendicitis, she broke her collarbone during a water fight at school.

Mrs Hewson said: "I remember the school phoning and I thought 'I do not want to answer this. What could it possibly be now?'"

To celebrate Amy’s remarkable recovery, the family is taking her on a horseriding holiday on a ranch in Colorado, USA.

"Hopefully there will be no accidents or illness," added Mrs Hewson.